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Saturday, 12 February 2011

NWA No Limits 14th May 2004 - DVD Review

As I continue to move around outside of my comfort zone, going to parts of the wrestling world I don’t normally visit, I’m now going back to 14th May, 2004, and a fan-cam release from NWA No Limits, featuring some stars I’ve never heard off and a few I know very well.

The show began with Shawn Daivari, doing the anti-American gimmick, taking on Canada’s finest, Petey Williams.

The somewhat sparse crowd were treated to a high quality opener as Williams and Daivari put on a fast paced back and forth encounter. At one point the crowd, in their infinite wisdom, began a “USA” chant in order to encourage Williams.

We got the usual rush of big moves at the end, with Daivari even countering the Canadian destroyer before Williams got the pin with a roll-up.

Inter-gender action followed as Mickie Knuckles took on Aaron Corbin. Knuckles, you may recall, earned a TNA deal a few years back before screwing it up by breaking her leg in a Sid Vicious way while performing a crazy jump during an indy show.

Despite being known more for her death match appearances these days Knuckles showed that she’s quite a good technical wrestler. Her exchanges with Corbin early on were great.

Corbin dominated the middle of the match before Knuckles made her spirited comeback, eventually getting the win by pinning Corbin with a northern lights suplex. Good stuff.

The regular singles action continued with Nate Webb going up against Ryan Boz.

It was actually quite a while before this match began, firstly because of the long rants of Boz’s tag team partner Brad Bradley, and secondly because of Webb’s never ending entrance, which involved leading a part of the crowd in a dance to his entrance music, and by the time they finally locked up it had been over ten minutes since Boz made his initial entrance.

By the time the match started I have to admit I’d lost interest a little. It was your typical power versus speed battle. Webb looked good, but there were times when Boz looked very limited, his actions looking very forced and lacking fluidity.

Boz took home the win here. After Webb missed a moonsault Boz connected with an over the shoulder sit down pile driver for the win.

The only tag team match of the show saw XXX-Plicit Content, Bryce Benjamin and Chandler McClure, Trik Davis and Murat Bosporus, and Tony Ricon and Juan Pourneau competing in a four way elimination match.

This is one of those bouts which fits into the “okay” column. There was nothing overly spectacular here. The action was solid, although there were a few sloppy moments early on and towards the end, and it didn’t really settle down until the XXX-Plicit boys and Benjamin/McClure were left to battle it out.

There seemed to be a bit of confused at the end of the match when Benjamin was rolled up by one of the XXX-Plicit boys. The referee counted to three, then seemed a little lost until it was announced who had actually won. There were no big celebrations afterwards so I’m guessing that the wrong team may have come out on top here.

It was back to singles action next as Ian Rotten took on Jimmy Jacobs, still in his Berserker faze here.

If like me you’re only familiar with Ian Rotten the death match wrestler then you may be pleasantly surprised by this match.

Although this featured some great comedy moments, including when Jacobs yelled “he pulled my boot hair!” it also featured some nice technical exchanges.

Rotten, of course, mixed in a few underhanded tactics, but in the end they didn’t help him as Jacobs took him down with sliced bread whatever number it is for the win.

The action then moved on to Arik Cannon taking on Chris Hero.

This was a really enjoyable bout. From the moment it started Hero and Cannon put on some great technical sequences, and the way Hero worked over Cannon’s left arm with a series of back breaker and suplex variations made sense in each and every way.

It also made sense that the end saw Cannon finally submitting to Hero’s cross face variation. Both men received a standing ovation for their efforts, and rightfully so.

Brad Bradley then made his second appearance of the evening, challenging Colt Cabana for the Illinois State title.

The comedy moments from Cabana were brief in this one. Ass soon as he blew out his knee and Bradley chop blocked him as he was being helped backstage it was all business.

Cabana was the proverbial one legged man in the ass kicking contest as Bradley went to work on his injured limb, with the champion discarding his knee pad and boot at one point.

But Bradley’s assault wasn’t enough to get the job done, with Cabana countering Bradley’s top rope superplex attempt with a gentle push, following up with a frog splash for the pin.

The main event saw Danny Daniels challenging A.J. Styles for the NWA World title.

Daniels began this one early, drop kicking Styles as soon as he’d taken his ring jacket off.

From there we got a highly entertaining back and forth encounter. It was the usual performance from Styles, giving it his all in a World title defence despite wrestling in front of a much smaller audience. As for Daniels, he really upped his game as he more than kept up with his more illustrious opponent.

After countless near falls from both men it was Styles who emerged victorious, finally putting his challenger away with the Styles clash.

In conclusion - apart from the slightly messy tag team encounter this is a quality show filled with great and at times somewhat surprising performances.

It was nice to see the likes of Williams and Styles outside of their normal 2004 Impact Zone environment, taking on opponent who they normally wouldn’t have faced at that time.

So if you don’t mind a DVD release devoid of high production values but filled with great action then this NWA No Limits show may be for you.